


Sleeping with ghosts

by mofumanju



Series: Keichi Ghost AU [1]
Category: Ensemble Stars! (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, M/M, but not that angsty as it might be, ghost au
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-10-20
Updated: 2016-11-11
Packaged: 2018-08-23 14:47:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 6,004
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8331823
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mofumanju/pseuds/mofumanju
Summary: The sky doesn’t cry, on the day he has to face reality, on the day he feels his childhood turned into ashes together with Keito’s body, the soft smell of incense brushing his shoulders like an embrace that, Eichi is sure, he will come to despise, now that he won’t feel that scent on his friend’s body anymore. In which Keito dies too young, and Eichi is not willing to let him go.At least not until he dies as well - which might be take a bit of time.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [penkipenguin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/penkipenguin/gifts), [curacere](https://archiveofourown.org/users/curacere/gifts), [despereaux](https://archiveofourown.org/users/despereaux/gifts).



> Well, this is not entirely my fault. Thanks goes to Penki, Jess and Aga on twitter for developing such a great concept thanks to Jess' tweets about Keito being dead and his vengeful spirits ruling over Yumenosaki.  
> Which lead to _this_. So, super self indulgent what if in which Keito died before Eichi but Eichi is still too attached to him to make his soul reach the Nirvana, LOL. EXPECT LOTS OF SHOTS FOR THIS BECAUSE WELL, YES. 
> 
> I love you. ♥

Eichi is eight years old, a fragile body made of glass bones and paper skin, when his life takes a path he wasn’t expecting, and he didn’t want. He lives on dreams made of drawing, stains of colour bringing warm to a live mostly made of hospitals and IVs that pierce his skin and leave marks on his arm for days, he lives on the company of someone that he innocently thought would be by his side forever.  
He’s too young to know that Fate sometimes might be cruel - he’s too young to come to terms with the fact that life doesn’t follow wishes and hopes of the silly humans inhabiting planet Earth. He’s too young, when his mother comes to school to get him home without a word, a sorrowful frown on her face as he holds that tiny, cold hand and bites her lips to fight the huge to cry in front of her son.  
Eichi is eight years old, a body made of glass bones and paper skin that falls apart slowly, that falls in a limbo made of broken promises and sudden absence that he doesn’t know how to deal with. The sky doesn’t cry, on the day he has to face reality, on the day he feels his childhood turned into ashes together with Keito’s body, the soft smell of incense brushing his shoulders like an embrace that, Eichi is sure, he will come to despise, now that he won’t feel that scent on his friend’s body anymore. He wants to bury his face on those ashes, breathe them and hope that Keito won’t go anywhere - and if he really has to go, that he will take Eichi with him. His body feels weak and empty, and it’s way too much for a eight years old to bear. How can he keep on living now, without the one he cherished the most, the only one on that silly world that made him feel loved, accepted, not a burden but a human being?  
“I miss you,” he whispers, face buried on the pillow of his bed, its pillow cover already soaked with tears that won’t stop, and make his head heavy. He’s short of breath, but he doesn’t care, not when he feels alone, smaller than he is, as he felt when Keito wasn’t yet into his life, and he tried to feel the emptiness watching boring tv programs until he fell asleep out of exhaustion. “You promised me you would have built me a pyramid, you promised, why did you have to go? Idiot, idiot, stupid idiot-”  
“Can you stop, please? Insulting me.”  
And it’s a moment, but Eichi can clearly feel it, his heart stopping beating. He raises his face from the pillow and looks around, and he just doesn’t make in time to process what he sees, because his mouth opens and lets screams go, too scared to articulate any clear sound.  
The last thing he can recall of that moment before he passes out is his mother calling his name, and green eyes staring at him in panic. 

Keito sits beside his bed, his arms crossed over Eichi’s legs, his head bent towards him - he never closes his eyes, apparently, and that’s what makes Eichi think that he’s dreaming, because normal people can’t get their eyes open for that long, can they? He tried, once, but it didn’t end up well. Eichi is not being monitored, and that’s good, because otherwise someone would notice he woke up, and now he finds it hard to stay calm, so he’s glad nobody is around.  
“I’m sorry,” are the first words he hears, when Keito opens his mouth and straightens up, as if he could really lean over the chair he’s sitting on. Something is off, on his body, like if it was incorporeal. Eichi wants to touch it, touch Keito’s hair and arms and chest and feel his scent wrapping him up, but he doesn’t dare to even try.  
He’s too scared.  
“You’re dead.”  
“Pretty much, yeah.” and the scroll of Keito’s shoulders his so natural, so Keito, that Eichi wonders if he’s not dreaming for real. “But I’m still here, you see.”  
Eichi feels his eyes slowly filling with tears, his sight already too blurred to distinguish Keito’s features. His little hands tighten on the sheets of his hospital bed, and oh, he hates how the smell of antiseptic is slowly blending with Keito’s scent of incense and death.  
“You’re not… a dream?”  
“You look pretty much awake for me,” and ah, Eichi didn’t expect it, but Keito reaches his hands and his touch is cold, shakes his body like winter does on his coolest days. “Does it feel weird?” Keito asks, and Eichi brushes a tear away, just because he wants to look at that face and realise his friend is really there, that the Keito in front of him isn’t a Keito his mind created to make fun of him, of his pain.  
“Yes,” he answers, blunt and on the edge of crying. Because it does feel weird, it feels like being touched and not being even brushed at the same time - he knows Keito’s hands are on his own just because of the cold that’s quickly invading his body in waves, and nothing more. “Keito?”  
“What?”  
“Are you… really here? I’m not mad, am I?”  
If it’s a dream, he doesn’t want to wake up. But if it was a dream then Keito’s hands would feel real, solid, warm as he recalls them to be, if it was a dream then he wouldn’t feel the need to hug him and cry. If that was a dream, Keito would be alive.  
But Keito is ashes and nothing more.  
“You’re not mad, Eichi. I’m really here. I don’t know why, but I am.”  
A child shouldn’t experience something like that. At eight years old someone like him should be free from the sorrow that accompanies death - instead, Eichi feels grief growing inside his chest like a blooming tree, and he’s not sure he wants to pick the fruits of it. His body shakes, as he tries to grasp those hands and failS, shakes as sobs of pure despair melt on his throat and wet his cheeks. He can hear Keito’s voice telling him not to cry, but how could he, when the thing he wants the most now his feeling an embrace that it’s lost forever? And it’s funny, how the air fills with sobs and prayers coming from the both of them, wetting their lips with pleas nobody will ever listen to, and Eichi is the only one who can hear them.  
He hates it, and at the same time, it’s the thing he cherishes the most, now. And as the nurses enter his room and try to soothe his soul, miserably failing, the only thing Eichi grabs on to his Keito’s voice screaming I’m here, I’m here, I won’t let you alone anymore on his ears.  
He wants to believe him. He doesn’t know how, but he will, eventually.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Keito is scary

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Second round. It will get better, eventually.  
> ♥

It’s hard, harder than he ever imagined. Everybody around him keeps telling that he should take his time, that losing a friend at such an early age is something difficult to elaborate - oh well, they don’t tell him directly, but Eichi keeps snooping around when his doctor talks with his parents after their sessions, because he’s only asked one thing, that makes him know his mother and father think his son is going insane.

_“Have you seen Keito, today?”_

He spends most of his days on bed, after he has come back from the hospital after _the accident_ , because that’s the only place where he’s alone most of the time, so nobody will judge him for talking with empty air, at least to anyone else’s eyes.   
  
“Why am I the only one who can see you?” he wonders, and it’s not really a question, not anymore, because he knows Keito wouldn’t know how to answer. Eichi has been read several stories involving ghosts when he was younger, but the only thing he learnt for them was that nothing good comes when your eyes can meet those of a creature of Death. And oh, maybe this is some kind of punishment, a prank played by God, Buddha, who knows, just because the first thing he thought about Keito when they met was that he looked like an adorable angel of Death.

He didn’t want it to be this extreme.   
  
He raises his head, and his eyes meet with Keito’s, a forced smile on his face as he holds it between his hands - he’s sitting at the foot of the bed, and it’s so strange, not to see Eichi’s bed sheets crumpling over the weight of his feet.

“I wish I could tell you, Eichi,” and the sigh that follows is a cold brush against his cheeks - and it hurts, it hurts so much when Eichi’s mind races back to all those time in which Keito was his own, personal heater.   
It hurts so much, when Eichi thinks that Keito was alive just a few weeks ago.

“What if someone comes and eats your soul?”   
  
He doesn’t even know where that comes from, probably a reminiscence of some old novel, or a legend he doesn’t recall any detail about. But the thought of Keito disappearing forever - like _for real,_ this time - gives him the goosebumps, and makes his voice sound concerned. But Keito doesn’t look too worried about it. At least, that’s what Eichi hopes.   
  
“Nobody will, stop it, you’re scary.”   
  
“How can ghosts get scared, Keito? You’re the scary one, now!”   
  
It doesn’t feel like Keito is not walking on his same land, when they chitchat like that - nothing has really changed, from that point of view. Eichi is still Eichi, and Keito is still Keito, even if well.   
  
Even if his body is made of thin air.

“I won’t talk to you anymore.”  
  
“Ah, liar. You’re still talking to me you k-”

The door of his room opens, just when Eichi has puts the sheets aside to crawl on his bed and towards his friend. His maid is looking at him in clear discomfort, her eyes wandering in the room as if she is expecting to see someone playing with him. But well, he’s alone to her eyes, and Eichi can’t stop that feeling of discomfort that’s building fast on his chest.

“Eichi-sama? Who were you talking to?”   
  
It’s so clear, how she doesn’t want to be in that room. But Eichi is tired, tired, _tired_ to always be asked the same question over and over again, and he ignores Keito trying to reach for him, he ignores his voice telling him not to tell the truth because who cares about the truth, at this point?

“Can you please leave? I was talking to my friend.”

He reads her mind. He knows what she’s going to say and he doesn’t want to hear that, he doesn’t want to, he doesn’t-

“Eichi-sama, Hasumi-kun is-”  
  
“Don’t. Please, I don’t-”   
  
“Eichi-sama, you should stop this-”   
  
“I told you to _leave_!”

He hates her. He hates her scared face as he raises his voice, he hates his lungs burning and his heart racing way too fast, now that he has jumped out of bed and is pushing the maid out of his room, “and don’t come here _ever again_ !”   
  
The door closes with a slam, Eichi leaning his back against it with his hands pressed on his eyes. He doesn’t want to cry, not again, not in front of Keito - Keito is there, he’s dead and okay that’s not the best thing in the world but they can still talk, they can still share the same room and pretend nothing happened, why is everyone making it so hard?   
  
Why can’t he just pretend that nothing has changed?

He falls on the floor as he swallows hard, tears already wetting the palm of his hands. He promised himself he would have never cried in front of Keito, and now look at his willpower scattering into pieces. The first hiccup escapes his lips and he can do nothing about it, nothing but let the other ones follow as well.   
  
He was just fine, moments ago. Why why why can’t they let him alone, why can’t they just pretend he’s gone insane for real?

Keito calls for his name, but his voice doesn’t reach his heart, doesn’t feel like the gentle rub on his head he used to give him when he was upset. It doesn’t help him to stop crying because yes, Keito is dead, Keito is not there and nobody will take him back, and everything is so disgusting now that oh, he wishes he was already dead as well.

He feels his throat hurt, his head getting lighter and lighter, but he can’t stop, he really can’t. If he tries, his lungs stop filling with air, and it would be good if he was able to fight the urge to breathe, he would be so good. But he stops, eventually, when the sound of something crashing on the floor reaches his ears and he’s forced to open his eyes.   
  
It’s scary. He doesn’t feel in danger, but it’s scary, because Keito’s eyes are shining, bright as stars near to explode, as he clutches his fists.   
  
“K-Keito?”   
  
He didn’t think ghost were able to cry. He didn’t think it would have come a day in which he would have seen Keito so angry, so mad - and the sun is still shining outside his room, but everything is trembling around him, shaking as there was a storm. Something scatters - the mirror before his bed cracks, as much as the window that falls into pieces on the floor, and Eichi would have appreciated the Sun reflecting on them and creating rainbows on the walls of his room, but he can’t now, not when he’s scared to death.   
  
What if Keito is really going to be eaten by some evil force?   
  
“Keito!” he calls him, tears still streaming down his face, and his legs are too weak to make him stand on his feet but he still can crawl - and he doesn’t mind the pieces of glass around him, he doesn’t care if he gets cuts on the palm of his hands, as long as he can do something.   
He doesn’t want Keito to disappear - he’s sure Keito will lecture him, when this will come to an end, he will lecture him and tell him he’s an idiot, to put his life at stake for a ghost. Because Keito will lecture him, won’t he? He will still pat his head, they will still be okay, even if things stopped being okay days ago.  

He doesn’t want to lose him, and the thought keeps repeating on his head and cutting his breath, but Keito is looking at him now, and the light in his eyes fades slowly, together with the wind.   
  
“I’m sorry.” they both whisper, as Keito collected himself again and Eichi finds support on his bed, tiny fists clutching around what remains of the sheets on it. He feels the cold touch of Keito’s fingers over the back of his hands - it’s just a breath, nothing tangible, but it still is Keito, that’s the Keito he has now, and it’s okay, if he can only feel cold instead of flesh and warmth, it’s fine.   
  
Really, it’s fine.   
  
The door opens again, and Eichi doesn’t know who’s holding him, who’s offering his shoulder to let him cry his tears. He doesn’t mind. Because it’s not Keito, it’s not his friend, and he could cry until he dies, he wouldn’t mind. 


	3. III

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Eichi wants to become jam

“I want to die,” Eichi says, arms crossed on the railing of the hospital roof and eyes wondering over the world outside his personal cage. There’s a smile on his face, and anybody else would assume that he’s just joking - or worse, that he doesn’t really know the real weight of the words leaving his mouth.  
  
Keito sighs, as his head lowers a bit over his chest, and his legs swing into nothing. “I won’t allow it,” and his voice is still, an order he won’t allow to be rejected. Eichi laughs - and why in the world should he, what in the world is so funny to be made fun of, now of all times? - and Keito can feel his eyes on him, now, but he doesn’t dare to look.   
  
He doesn’t want to see.   
  
“I’m tired,” and God, Keito wished that was a lie, just the tantrum of a lazy child who’s tired to walk on his own feet. That’s the problem, here - Eichi is serious, too serious for a ten years old that should be only thinking about playing with his friend and studying for his future, instead of wasting his life in a hospital bed and waiting for a miracle to happen. “What’s the point in living like this anyway? It’s useless.”   
  
“It’s not. You will be better, one day.”  
  
“We both know that’s a lie.”  
  
Keito doesn’t know if Eichi has grown up too fast - if they both have started to think in a different way, compared to children of their age - but he wouldn’t be surprised to find out he’s right: death changes you, for better or for worse. And sometimes Keito is sure that Death is a closer friend to Eichi than Keito himself.

“But I’m fine with it, you know?” Eichi keeps talking, and when Keito finally turns to look at him he sees no sadness into those clear eyes, calm as the sea in the first days of summer. “If I die, I won’t feel bad anymore, I won’t feel tired. And If i die…” and he stops, holding his breath for a moment and closing his eyes, a soft smile growing on his lips.  “...maybe I’ll be able to feel you again.”

Keito doesn’t reply, leading his sight elsewhere. And it’s stupid, feeling like that - it’s surreal feeling anything at all, to be honest, because the sorrow filling his chest is probably just a reminiscence of his past life and not something he’s feeling for real - but his eyes are stinging, and he is on the edge of crying. It makes such a strange contrast, that Eichi is the one to smile, between them. “Idiot,” he mutters, shaking his head, and when Eichi answers with a laugh he thinks hard to find a way to make him live as long as possible.  
  
Why should he be there, if not to protect him?

“I know I am. But I can’t help thinking that if I jumped now, I could touch you in a second. And I’d become jam the moment I touch the asphalt but at least my family wouldn’t have to spend money to cremate me.”

“It doesn’t work like that.”  
  
“Make me dream.”

“This is the most idiotic dream I’ve ever heard about, Eichi. And I don’t like it, so please stop.”  
  
“You’re spoiling all the fun.”  
  
His hands, so small and thin, grasp to the railing as Eichi straightens his back and breathes. He loves the hospital roof, because nobody comes there, nobody is strong enough to bring themselves there - not even Eichi himself. But still, it’s the most peaceful place he knows in that place, the spot he can feel one step closer to freedom and for which he gladly drags himself up to the stairs almost everyday, when he feels good enough. He raises an arm, opening his hand to the sky. 

“Keito?”  
  
“What.”

“I’m glad you are here,” and he doesn’t add anything else, but Keito is scared to know what those words mean, what’s the real meaning behind that simple sentence. It’s a moment, and in a blink of the eye Eichi feels a cool, strangely familiar pressure over his head, Keito’s hand brushing his hair with a kindness that he doesn’t show often. It’s not even comparable to the warm touch of a hand in flesh and bones, but they both must be happy with that.   
  
It’s the most important thing they have, now.  



	4. IV

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not so angsty, quite gay if i must be honest.  
> They're around 13, here.

The moon is bathing them with its light, Eichi’s hands looking paler than they usually do when he’s stuck in that bed that nobody wants him to leave. He’s slowly accepting the fact that he will spend most of his life in hospital, and that’s probably thanks to Keito. 

  
It’s not like he feels alone anymore, now that his friend is always there for him - sometimes, Eichi thinks of him as a shadow, more than as a ghost, but he doesn’t dare to put his thoughts into words, because it would be too much, being so noticeably happy of something like that. It’s not like Keito wanted to die, after all - it’s not like  _ he  _ wanted Keito to die. He gained Keito’s time, his whole attention, but at what cost. Eichi raises his eyes and looks at his friend, and the Moon has almost no effect on him; there is no shadow behind his back, just the faint hint of a pearly glimmer around his figure, as if he was glowing. He raises a hand, touching the phantom of Keito’s cheek, and drawing his attention. 

“Mh?”

“Ah. I’m sorry.” he says, not sure of how to go on. “You’re shining.”   


Keito tilts his head, Eichi’s words probably a mystery for him. But he doesn’t pull back, closing his eyes. Eichi wonders how his touch must feel on Keito’s skin, he wonders if he feels anything at all, when his fingers trace an invisible path on his cheek, from his eyes and down his chin. He’s beautiful, and the thought of Keito being so ephemeral, made of the same stuff as dreams, breaks his heart.    
He wishes he could touch him for real, now. Would it be okay to give part of his lifespan just to be able to feel his warmth again?   


Keito’s eyes glow, when they meet Eichi’s - it’s just a glimpse, flakes of gold catching the moonlight and turning his eyes into jewels. Eichi takes his hand back to his lap, and Keito’s gaze burns his skin.   


He feels something growing on his chest, but he doesn’t know how he should name it. It doesn’t make him uncomfortable, but he feels slightly tense: he reminds him the same feeling he gets when he’s waiting to be dismissed from hospital - it’s fear, and happiness at the same time.

“Eichi,” Keito asks, and his voice is soft and warm, so much in contrast with the cold that has invaded Eichi’s fingers when he touched him. “How do you see me?”   


“Mh? What do you mean?”

Keito takes a few moments to gather his thoughts, because he doesn’t speak a word for a few seconds, seconds that Eichi uses to imprint his face, his shiny eyes on the back of his mind.    


“I can’t see myself when I look at the mirror. Is it always me? Did I change, is my face always the same? Am I-”   


“You are,” Eichi hastens to answer, because Keito’s voice is stained with a subtle panic - something that they haven’t heard often, in the past years, but that they both know wouldn’t bring anything good. He looks for Keito’s hand, and he doesn’t mind if he’ll find himself freezing in a few minutes, because he knows it too well, what it means to feel lost when nobody is around to hold you, and keeping you in touch with reality (the fact that he doesn’t grasp yet what reality means to Keito scares him, but he has no time to think about it, now). “You never leave that grumpy look on your face, even when you’re relaxed. Most of the time I can see through you, and it was scary at first, but now it’s okay. It’s... funny, forgive my lack of tact. Sometimes I think I want to try crossing over your body, but I think I might freeze to death if I did it for real, and I’m not ready to listen to your lecture for my whole time in the afterlife, which I bet it’s pretty long. But it would make me happy.”   


“Crossing over me?”   


“Feeling you.” Eichi stops, and he thanks God for the lights turned off, because he can feel a gentle warm spreading through his face, but now that the only source of light is the moon, it’s barely noticeable. He clears his voice, and speaks again, hoping not to sound too embarrassing. “But well, there are times when you really look… solid. Touchable. 

When you’re particularly happy, or particularly sad. Sometimes your body becomes almost invisible, that scared me a lot, to be honest, but it doesn’t happen too much so I guess it’s okay?”

“... I’m not going anywhere, you know.”

“I know,” he smiles, looking at Keito with soft eyes, and he wonders why his heart has started to beat faster - he doesn’t feel bad, it doesn’t feel bad. “But can you try not to be too angry? Because when you are, your body becomes… air, like, for real. Wind and stuff and… and I don’t like it. I don’t like to see you angry, and I don’t like to see that much through you.”   


“Don’t get me angry, then,” and they both chuckle, Keito shaking his head and letting a smile grow on his lips. “I’ll try my best not to get mad at you as well.”

“Hey, I never make you angry?”   


“Oh, if you do.”

Eichi doesn’t mind spending his nights awake, he doesn’t mind the moon being the sole witness of that relationship that regular people think of as madness; even being confined to a hospital bed doesn’t taste like tragedy on the tip of his tongue, now, because he was gifted, he is gifted, and as long as Keito will stay by his side, he’s ready to anything.    



	5. V

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Written for Keichi 69mins: death
> 
> YOU CAN'T SPELL FUNERAL WITHOUT FUN THEY SAY

Years later, that smell makes Eichi’s stomach still twist in pain, and he’s glad that he doesn’t have to show any feelings, right now, because it’d be too hard, he wouldn’t be able to. His throat hurts, his ears ring in an unpleasant way, because the smell of incense is making him sick, eyes stinging and tears begging to come out.    


Keito’s father is praying, his voice low and warm, a stab on his chest at every word that leaves his lips. It brings back memories, wounds that never healed, and it’s not really relevant the fact that Keito is holding his hand - Eichi feels his presence even if he can’t allow himself to look at him, even if he has to pretend he’s not with him ( _ pretend he’s dead _ ), and he tries to grasp it even if he knows it will be useless.

There’s his father’s sister on that coffin, and still Eichi sees the picture of his best friend smiling at him with gentle eyes _ ,  _ still remembers how much his wish to die with him was strong - and how still is, sometimes, when he dreams about them being younger and happy, when he dreams about Keito’s hands on his head, patting him, when he dreams about-

“Eichi,” and Keito’s voice is a balm for his soul, stronger than anything else even if so low, a gentle stroke on his ear. Eichi tries to swallow a knot that formed on his throat when he stepped on the temple and nods, looking at him with the corner of his eyes. “I’m here.”

And he knows Keito is there, he feels him, cold and biting on the palm of his hand, but it’s hard to divert his mind from thinking about the past - and for a moment his sight blank, and he feels like fainting. 

He closes his eyes, breathing sharply - why can’t he turn back time, why was their Fate so cruel? He feels so nauseous, now, that he wouldn’t mind collapsing in the middle of the ceremony - as if he could care about someone who never showed him love, anyway. 

But Keito has other plans for him. He feels something cold pressing gently against his forehead, and Keito is not beside him anymore. “I’m here,” and it’s a relief, to hear his voice so close, to feel Keito’s incorporeal body pushing against his back as his hand cools him down. “It’ll be over soon, hold on.”

And Eichi tries his best, he really does, but the wish to fall back and hope to be caught by Keito is so strong now, that he would do it just to hit the face against the sad wall that’s a world in which Keito can’t hold him because he doesn’t exist anymore. 

He’s crying before he even notices it.


	6. VI

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You can eat my heart Hasumi-kun. ♥

Keito is used to it - he’s used to the smell of blood that gets stronger when Eichi doesn’t feel  well, he’s used to the scent of death constantly lingering around his friend. He already was when he was alive, but now it’s different, now it’s  _ more real, _ the feeling of something sticky soiling his skin and making him feel nervous, as if he still had a real body able to feel that kind of emotion. He always try to conceal his worry, when those moments come and Eichi starts to feel absent-minded, too weak to even raise a hand or make any kind of silly joke, but it’s so hard when he feels like something is eating him from the inside.

Silly, to feel so much and still being incorporeal.

Keito is used to it; he just needs to get closer to Eichi to feel Death itself vibrating against his fingers, claiming a soul that he won’t permit to be taken so easily: it’s been year since his death, and he still doesn’t know why his soul hasn’t left the Earth yet, but Keito is sure that he’s there for a reason, and that reason owns the blond hair and blue eyes of someone too precious for him to let him die anytime soon. Sometimes he prays for death to forget about Eichi, when he feels the weakest and he fears it the most.    


Sometimes, he can do nothing but watch.

And it’s painful, watching. It’s worse than dying, worse than feeling each of his bones breaking, worse than being unable to breathe because of pleural fluid and blood filling his lungs. He’s always been like this since they were children, with Eichi feeling bad and he standing on his bedside, but he never got used to this, and sometimes he wonders if things will ever change.    


He’s promised him so many times that things would get better, eventually, and Fate seems to be giving its best to prove him wrong.    
Like now.    


Because Eichi is bent in two, slowly falling to the ground on his knees as he holds his stomach and soils the floor with blooming, red flowers, and Keito is so powerless, as he tries to support him and fails, that he’d cry if he could. He feels so powerless, when the smell of blood stains the air around them and his voice seems unable to reach for his friend. 

And he feels even worse when Eichi’s eyes close, and everything around him gets blank and dull.

 

He wants to scream.

Keito doesn’t know if he lost consciousness, he doesn’t even know if he can actually do it since he has not a body, but now he feels like he has been underwater for too long, and his lungs ache to breathe some air. Eichi is awake, eyes glued on him - eyes filled with fear, pure, simple fear thick like black oil stick to a bird’s feathers. He tries so hard not to close them, and Keito feels his chest tightening at that sight, because he know the reason behind his gesture.   


And he can’t blame him. 

The rhythm of the sound coming from the electrocardiograph increases, so fast that Keito is scared Eichi is going to have a heart attack - he jumps from his place and takes the step he needs to reach for his friend, to reach for his hand and hold it as he can, hoping that the cold touch can help him to calm down, to realise that Keito hasn’t gone anywhere.    


He doesn’t know if it worked, or if it made things worse, because Eichi is staring at him now, eyes filled with tears that he doesn’t want to fall, and still roll down his cheeks tracing paths Keito doesn’t want to see, doesn’t want to follow. He hates it, not being able to brush them away, he hates the feeling eating his chest and the voice in his head telling him he’s useless.    


He hates it. 

 

Keito is used to it - he’s used to the sweet, fleeble scent of flowers on Eichi’s nightstand that invades the whole room and makes him feel like he’s always in front of a shrine, more that in the bedroom of a child. He’s used to the slow decay of colorful petals that turn to ashes, shining in golden yellow before falling and dying. He doesn’t like not being able to take care of them, like he did when he was younger and and he lost the time Eichi spent resting looking at them, breathing their scent and wishing that flowers brought with them spells he couldn’t hear, but that could heal his friend - childish hopes crashed against a wall called reality, too cold, too hard.

He’s looking at the flowers, now - white roses and little daisies that smell like nothing, smell like ground and salt. He brushes lightly one petal, looking at it as it creases a bit under his cold touch, and that’s enough to make him withdraw his hand.    
He feels awful. 

But he hasn’t time to waste on his own feelings, when a soft sob coming from his side breaks the silence and shakes his soul. Eichi is awake, a arm covering his eyes as his chest jerks in sobs that he doesn’t look able to hold, his lower lip between his teeth.   


“Eichi? Does it hurt anywhere?” Keito asks, because that’s the only thing he can do now, the most useless thing in the world - but still something. Eichi shakes his head though,  and Keito feels disoriented, feels like something just broke, but he doesn’t know what.

Eichi opens and closes his mouth several times, before he starts to stop sobbing, and those noises turns into words that still Keito struggles to understand.    


“If you disappear, what will I do?” he starts, but his voice is broken, fear eating his words, soaking them with pain and fear, the beginning of a delirium Keito can’t avoid, Keito can’t stop. “If you disappear what will I do? Where will I look? Don’t go away, don’t leave me alone. I’ll give you everything you want, I’ll give you my life, I’ll give you my heart-”   


Keito feels his hands moving on his own, reaching for his free hand - he doesn’t dare to try to convince him to pull away the arm on his eyes, because he knows that’s just a way to avoid a reality in which Keito might not exist anymore, a reality in which Eichi is mad and he’s nothing but a memory lingering around his childhood friend. 

“You can have it, Keito- You can have it, you can eat it, you can- I don’t want you to- I don’t-”

The rest of Eichi’s words are an heap of words he might not understand, but that reach his chest and fill it with sorrow, fill it with the despair of someone who knows he has already lost. Keito holds his hand, feeling that familiar warmth wrapping him, and he can’t do nothing more than lean over him, try to hide, if not his body, at least the tears of a distress he was the cause to.    


He must endure for the two of them.

But it’s so hard. And he hates it.


End file.
